Dropbox app using a lot of memory in Linux Kubuntu 25.10

I also began experiencing the same problem over the past week. The Dropbox client can no longer index files without using absurd amounts of memory. Fortunately (or unfortunately), OOMs freeze my computer, so I can definitively say that Dropbox did not exhibit this behavior on December 24th, 2025 (when my computer restarted and did not subsequently OOM), but started exhibiting this behavior on December 30th, 2025 (when my computer restarted and then OOMed after 6 hours). My understanding is that Dropbox always reindexes files on-disk after a restart to make sure nothing changed while the Dropbox client was not running. On December 30th, the Dropbox process began continuously consumes more and more memory over about 6 hours until it crashes. During the 6 hours, Dropbox memory usage grows to about 16 GB of memory. Throughout all of this, the Dropbox tray icon says "Starting...", and no files are actually synchronized. Restarting just the Dropbox process results in the same outcome.

I do have a large number of files in Dropbox (~500k I think) and tried adjusting my selective sync settings to synchronize nothing (all folders unchecked). But even after restarting the Dropbox client, it continues to exhibit high memory usage and never finishes initial indexing. My understanding is that selective sync settings can't take effect until Dropbox finishes indexing the contents of the Dropbox folder (to prevent data loss from unsynchronized changes), so it seems like it's not helpful for this scenario.

I deleted a large number of redundant files in my Dropbox folder locally on my computer, reducing the file count from ~500k to 138,192. But this didn't help with Dropbox process memory usage.

I've also tried updating the Dropbox client with the `dropbox update` command, but I get an error when I try to do that:

```
$ dropbox update
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/bin/dropbox", line 1567, in <module>
    ret = main(sys.argv)
          ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/bin/dropbox", line 1556, in main
    result = commands[argv[i]](argv[i+1:])
             ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/bin/dropbox", line 851, in update
    download()
  File "/usr/bin/dropbox", line 293, in download
    import gi
ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'gi'
```

Right now Dropbox is unusable on my device as a result of this issue.

More information:

• Operating system: Ubuntu 24.04
• Data amount: 1.5 TB
• Number of files in Dropbox: ~500k
• Number of files on disk: 138,192
• Filesystem: ZFS